1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to connectors, including optical transceivers. More specifically, the present invention relates to a cradle for holding a plurality of connectors.
2. Description of the Related Art
Equipment installations using interconnects with very high channel counts have a need for one or more integrated subsystems with large numbers of optical links (e.g., 48, 96 up to 800, etc. links) per module, instead of having to make separate connections or making connections with a few channels at a time. A channel is a single path used to transmit and/or receive signals. A channel can include, for example, an optical fiber and the electrical path(s) connected to the optical fiber that are used to transmit and/or receive signals. Additionally, many equipment installations also use a clear path to a 28 Gbps line rate, which precludes the use of a connection architecture having multiple connectors in the RF path.
A conventional solution to the issue of increasing channel count in interconnects involved increasing the line count in a single connector through the use of a quad small form-factor pluggable (QSFP) transceiver as compact transceivers to connect network devices to cables. Another solution involves the CXP copper connector system that provides up to twelve channels suitable for ethernet. Additionally, conventional solutions included the Mini Serial-Attached Small-Computer-System-Interface (SCSI) High-Density (Mini-SAS HD) board connectors and cable assemblies, which include ×1, ×2, and ×4 connector assemblies.
Increasing the number of optical channels in a single subsystem by mounting multiple optical engines or other connector types on a single printed circuit board (PCB) or substrate (e.g., PCIEOx8, etc.) makes manufacturing difficult as the yield per channel is required to be maintained at a very high level to have a reasonable overall yield. For example, a 48-channel module with a channel yield of 99% has approximately a 50% overall yield. It is thus desirable to have components with a limited number of channels, for example, 12, and provide some type of structure or way to readily connect a plurality of these components to a PCB or some other substrate.